I don't like spiders & snakes, and that ain't what it takes to love me...

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SnapCracklePop

SnapCracklePop

Feeling the Heat
Hearth Supporter
Sep 29, 2010
269
Southwestern Penna
Crikey, I can't get that tune outta my head.

I'm finding some centipede-type critters under the bark of some punky oak that I have in my woodpile. The wood has been lying around in my yard for 5 years. Every now and again I pitch one of the punky ones into a really hot fire. I can't drum up much sympathy for the crispy critters... I was kinda hoping they'd all have frozen by now, but no.

There was a garter snake in my woodpile last summer, but s/he is long gone. Actually, I don't mind snakes. It's the little creepy-crawlies that give me the willies.

I can't be certain, but I think the bugs are in some white oak that I had cut down when the tree got a smelly disease. It was oozing a smelly liquid from underneath the bark. The liquid attracted bees and other insects. A tree guy said he had no idea what the disease was; he'd never seen such a thing. He suggested I remove as much bark as I could. I went after it and scrubbed the parts of the trunk that were laid bare, but the disease kept spreading. I must have removed about 8 square feet of bark surface. Eventually I had the tree cut down.

Weird.

Nancy
 
Thanks, Eileen! All that and the Smothers Brothers, too!
 
Well Nancy, you could maybe fry those critters for supper! :bug:
 
Backwoods Savage said:
Well Nancy, you could maybe fry those critters for supper! :bug:
Click to expand...

Oh, Dennis! It'll be a cold day in heck when I do that! It's all I can do to watch Survivorman...
 
I had an American elm that was doing the samething as it died. I couldn't go near the tree because of all the wasps, jackets, bees, flies and butterflies that were on it. It was weird, just covered with them!
 
Wingman said:
I had an American elm that was doing the samething as it died. I couldn't go near the tree because of all the wasps, jackets, bees, flies and butterflies that were on it. It was weird, just covered with them!
Click to expand...

Wingman, you ever find out what it was? It's hard to describe the smell, but the tree was about 75 feet from my house, and with the living room windows open I could smell it in the house. Well, when the prevailing wind was from the Southwest, anyway. The smell was kind of like spoiled vinegar.

Nancy
 
I never noticed a smell emitting from it. A wind finally took the tree down and our local street crew came and took it since it was next to the street. I think they said it was dutch elm, but 2 guys in their 20's who also pickup trash might not be the most reliable resource.
Unfortunately I didn't have an insert just a regular fireplace and I asked them to leave a few logs...looking back, I would have taken the whole thing.
 
I have a healhty White Oak in the front yard that oozes a liquid from a patch of damaged bark. The liquid attracts bees, hornets, wasps, butterflies, and other insects. I haven't noticed a smell. As far as I can tell the tree is very healthy.
 
The way that ooze was spreading, I would have girdled the tree completely before too long.

The rounds from the branches developed little white fungion the cut ends, next to the bark. They looked like little miniature bracket fungi. It's dark here now; if I have any left in the woodpile I can get a photo.

=================

I wanted to start a new thread in the Ash Can, but it's closed...

My signature mentions birdseed-raiding bears, and I'm just wondering. I had a bear with its nose pressed against my screen door the evening of June 2. My dogs were barking their heads off, and the bear (she, I think) wasn't at all concerned. She was after a bag of birdseed that I had right inside the door. Without a thought, I rushed up and slid the door closed (sliding glass door...). She was just about to figure out that she could get thru the flimsy screen with one swipe of her claws.

But...

That's the last I've seen of her or any bear. I hope they weren't "harvested" (I hate that word) during bear season.

:(
 
fungion the cut ends

is the same as fungi on the cut ends...

good grief.
 
The condition is called "slime flux." It's pretty common on many species. The slimy exudate is sap that is being fermented by bacteria and wild yeast. The smell reminds people of vinegar or sour beer. There's really no treatment for it, though hosing the affected area with water might make it look and smell better for a little while. Don't ever remove any bark unless it's loose and dead; that will do the tree lots more harm than good. Here is a good discussion:
(broken link removed to http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/depts/pp/notes/oldnotes/od8.html)
 
Yep -- that's what it was; slime flux. I really don't think that tree could have been saved. It had a bad case of slime flux. I have a couple of other trees that look suspicious, but I've been leaving them alone and, so far, no further problems.

That article mentions drought as one possible stressor to bring it on. We had a couple of very dry years, and my well ran dry at about that time.

Interesting...
 
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